Smíchov School

66 teams from all over the world participated in this competition, which translates into work of more than 250 architects, urbanists, engineers and other professionals who spent in total around 58 800 hours on the designs for the new school.

The new school should provide innovative suggestions not only for its own pedagogic activity but offer intriguing possibilities for the rest of the period that the children (and not only they) spend inside the building – the overall organisation of space, the original planning of specialised classrooms, or the conception of spaces for class breaks, the lunch hour, and areas for post-school activities or clubs. In addition, it should address the contact with the outdoor environment – with public parks and with the school sports grounds.

The building should allow for meetings and social actions of the entire school in a separate auditorium or a central communication space that can be variably usable for these purposes. The building should be conceived so as to contribute to community life in the new district, allow for organisation of afternoon clubs and sports activities, as well as for holding events outside of the school framework. For sports clubs and recreation activity, the outdoor sporting grounds should be kept free for full use in afternoon and evening hours.